by Dana Marton
Whatever. He wasn’t planning on Blackwell going to trial. But he moved forward, the light landing on a regulation army shovel and a pair of dirty boots. Straight ahead, at the end of the short passageway, stood yet another door, this one plain wood, no super security here.
He kicked it in on the first try.
And then they were in the gallery next door, Graham Lanius’s life-size portrait the first thing his flashlight hit. And behind it, two familiar-looking mushroom paintings.
Suddenly, everything clicked into place.
Graham had recommended the artist for the commission. He’d probably gone out to the mushroom factory for the handover of the paintings. And had gotten spores on his shoes…
Jack turned on his heels and dashed back through the passageway, pushing Mike aside. “Ashley Price. Call it in!”
Then he ran as if his life depended on it.
* * *
“Mommy,” the little girl cried again.
Fury swirled inside him. He didn’t want the girl. He didn’t need the girl.
He had plans, and nobody was going to ruin them. He gripped the gun hard. Then drew a deep breath and forced himself to think.
Fine. The kid was here. He would deal with it. He was smarter than the rest of them put together. Certainly smart enough to adjust his plan on the fly. He prided himself on creativity.
The story would have to change.
The evidence would show that Ashley Price snapped, went crazy. She took her own life and took her kid with her. Not that far a stretch, considering last year’s accident on the reservoir.
When he was finished with them, after all three were dead, including Jack, he could come back to the house and type up a suicide note on her laptop. Spell it out, not leave the cops too much to think about.
He drew another deep breath. It would work. All right.
As the mother stirred, he backed out of the room and went for the kid.
* * *
Ashley woke from a dreamless sleep to her daughter’s voice. But when she opened her eyes, instead of Maddie she saw a dark figure looming over her bed, his gun glinting in the dim light. With his other hand, the man held Maddie.
Her heart jumped into her throat, her sleep-fogged brain scrambling to think.
Then the man shifted, and the pale moonlight washed over his face.
Recognition shocked her. “What are you doing here? What do you want?”
“Get up.” He backed away, and, as she slipped from the bed, thrust her daughter at her.
“Mommy.”
“It’s okay, honey.” She gathered her trembling baby up into her arms. “It’s okay, baby. It’s okay.”
“Down the stairs.” Graham gestured with the gun.
“Please don’t do this.” Why? Her brain couldn’t catch up with the moment. But she moved. He was clearly deranged. She didn’t want to make him angry. “What do you want?”
“Outside,” he said when they reached the bottom of the stairs.
“I’m sorry. I know I was rude to you. I didn’t mean it. We can talk. I apologize.”
His only response was a cold sneer as he shoved her from behind.
* * *
Jack dialed Ashley as he drove. She didn’t pick up her cell and not her landline either.
And then at last he glanced at the message that had come in earlier, from Ashley’s number. One heart-stopping word.
GOODBYE.
The bastard was setting her up. Another trap, Jack realized. A trap baited with something Blackwell knew Jack wouldn’t be able to resist.
A trap he would willingly walk into this time. He didn’t care if he died tonight, he didn’t even care what happened to Blackwell—as long as Ashley lived.
He slammed his foot on the gas. Dark premonitions settled on him as he drove, filling his chest with lead. He was going so fast he nearly flipped the car over when he turned the last corner. But he reached her house in record time, didn’t bother to shut off the engine as he ran for the door, banged on it. “Ashley? It’s Jack.”
Nobody answered.
“Police. Open up.” He banged again, then swore and kicked the door in, weapon in hand.
He scanned the downstairs. Swore when he spotted Maddie’s pink coat on the peg, her pink boots on the floor under it. Was she spending the night?
“Ashley? Maddie, honey?” He ran upstairs. Empty, though both their beds looked slept in.
He stood in the middle of Ashley’s bedroom, fear and fury coursing through him as he scanned everything, desperate for a clue that would lead him to them. Then his gaze snapped to the window. The room was in the back of the house, the window looking over Hadley Road and the reservoir. Moonlight glinted off a vast expanse of white.
His eyes caught on the dark shapes moving across the ice.
* * *
Her feet were frozen, her bedroom slippers little protection against the snow. Ashley wrapped her arms around her daughter as best she could, trying to keep Maddie warm. Her own body shook, and not only because of the cold. Dark panic gripped her as she shuffled forward on the ice.
For the past year, she had barely been able to look at the reservoir. And now here she was, the place where Dylan had died, where she’d lost her life, then gained it back, thanks to the paramedics. Where she had nearly lost Maddie.
So much grief and guilt was tied up in this expanse of rough ice. She couldn’t think here. All the fear of the past was getting mixed up with the panic of the present.
She forced her brain to focus. “Why are you doing this, Graham?”
The man shoved her toward a dark hole hacked into the ice. Another kind of grave. She recognized her axe next to it, the handle painted pink. He must have taken it from her garage. Next to the axe, a large cement brick waited with a rope tied to it. He pointed to that. “Tie it around your waist.”
She felt lightheaded, as if all her blood had left her body. “You can have the paintings. You can have whatever you want.”
He gave a harsh laugh. “You think this is about your so-called art? You don’t know what real art is. I didn’t even mind. I liked you anyway. I could have taught you. I didn’t plan it like this. But you chose him.”
She couldn’t think. She was too scared for her brain to work.
“You shouldn’t have dug up Sullivan,” he told her, his voice hard and filled with hate.
Her mind spun to process that, her throat tightening as she made sense of it at last. “You’re Brady Blackwell?”
“I’m the Master,” he snapped at her. “Someday, they’ll all know that. Someday, when nobody even remembers your name, my art will be worshipped.”
“Let Maddie go. Please,” she begged. “She’s just a child.”
“Old enough to finger me.” He shook his head. “I’m prepared to be misunderstood and persecuted for my genius. I won’t be the first in history. But not yet. My work isn’t finished.”
He talked like a man possessed, his tone cold, his mind focused on his delusions of grandeur. And she understood at last that there was no reasoning with him.
He kicked the rope toward her. “Tie it around your waist.”
She put Maddie down, pushed her daughter away when she wanted to cling to her leg. She bent as if to pick up the rope. She was scared of that hole in the ice. She was more scared of that dark, frigid water than she’d ever been of anything. But she lunged forward, her head ramming into Graham’s midsection as she grabbed him and twisted with him, plunging both of them in.
“Run!” she yelled to Maddie with her last breath before she went under.
Since Graham had gone in first, he was under her for a second before he shoved her aside and clawed up for air. She broke the surface next to him.
Maddie still stood where she left her, crying. “Mommy!”
“Run!” Desperation gave strength to her voice even as the cold seeped into her bones.
“Stay!” Graham thundered, and Maddie froze in place.
Ashley held on
to the edge of the ice that was crumbling under her fingers. She was already frozen through, to her soul. Graham was better dressed. He was bulkier. Stronger. If he made it out and she didn’t…
She couldn’t let anything happen to Maddie.
The rope lay on the ice next to her. She wrapped it around her arm, then grabbed the brick. She took one last look at her crying daughter then yanked in the brick and went under, grabbed Graham’s coat with her other hand, and pulled him away from the ledge, down into the deep darkness.
He might have had other advantages, but she’d died here once before. She had practice. And she wasn’t afraid of dying again. Not if it saved Maddie.
He fought hard, but he couldn’t counteract both her body weight and the weight of the brick. And he couldn’t pry her off him either. He shot at her several times but missed in the churning, dark water.
Please, God, just keep Maddie safe.
Her body was going numb fast. Her ears were ringing. Graham let go of the gun, or maybe it slipped from his cold fingers. It floated by her, but she couldn’t grab it. She would let go of neither the brick nor Graham.
He tried to shove her away, panicking now, frantic, bubbles going up from his mouth, losing air as he struggled. She stayed calm and just hung on. There was peace down here, in the dark water, knowing she saved her daughter.
Then his grip grew weaker at last. His fingers slid off her arm.
She was cold, so cold. She couldn’t move. The brick anchored her to the bottom, the rope tangled around her arm and holding her in place even when her frozen fingers slipped off it. She had no strength left to free herself. Hypothermia. Her body was slowing.
Over the past year, she‘d thought more than once that maybe she should have died under the ice. She’d cheated death. So maybe this was right. Maybe this was her destiny.
For a second, she saw a mirage of Dylan’s little face float in front of her. No anger in his eyes, no fear, no blame. He smiled at her with all the love only a child could give. He seemed so real.
He reached for her and touched the rope, which slid off her arm and disappeared in the deep.
Up, he mouthed, his blue little-boy eyes serene.
Yet, for a moment, staying seemed so tempting. Right here, she could lay down the guilt, the visions, the fear. Death was peaceful and all accepting.
But as Dylan’s face faded away, she chose life anyway, gathering up the last of her strength and kicking her legs, shoving Graham out of her way.
She swallowed water, tried to go back up, but her head bumped into solid ice she couldn’t break through. She’d floated away from the hole while she’d struggled with Graham. His body floated next to her, buoyed by the air trapped in his down jacket. Her lungs burned as she banged on the bottom of the ice with her fists.
“Ashley!” the shout came from above, as if from a great distance, through the sound of rushing blood in her ears.
Jack.
But he was too late. Her vision dimmed; she choked down water as her lungs gasped for air. Then that strange, floating, fading feeling came, one she was familiar with.
When the axe burst through the ice next to her, she barely registered it. When Jack reached in for her, grabbing on to her shoulder, she could do nothing to help. Then her head finally broke out of the water, and she went up choking, coughing up water, trying painfully to gulp some air.
Jack lay on his stomach to distribute his weight evenly, dragging her to air and life, to safety.
“On your stomach,” he ordered as he dragged her completely out. “Are you okay?”
All she could do was nod, sputtering.
And then she watched helplessly as he slipped into the water.
“Mommy? I’m scared.” Her daughter was sobbing somewhere behind her.
“Stay where you are, honey.” She crawled that way, away from the hole. She kept one eye on her daughter, another out for Jack, but he didn’t pull back up above the water.
Her heart pounded hard in her ears, her entire body shaking. Then she reached Maddie, and at the same time, Jack came up, sputtering, dragging Graham up onto the ice with him. He began CPR the second they were clear, banging on the man’s chest.
“Mommy.” Maddie burrowed against her, the wet mess she was. “Jack said I had to stand right here. He said I couldn’t move, and he would get you back.” Her little lips were blue. “He saved you like a prince.”
Ashley wanted to tell her how much she loved her, but she couldn’t speak. She was crying, clutching her daughter, never wanting to let her go again.
Sirens sounded in the distance, then closer. Then the police were there and two ambulances. She was too frozen to talk to anyone. Bing came around. He helped her into the back of the ambulance and told the EMTs to take good care of her. Then he ran off toward Jack.
“Don’t do anything stupid. FBI is on their way,” he yelled.
Graham, a heap of soggy clothes, began coughing water out of his lungs. Jack knelt over the man, breathing hard, his face illuminated by the lights of the emergency vehicles. He didn’t look at her. He didn’t look at anyone. His world consisted of one man, the one before him. He was back in the world of darkness and vengeance he’d created and lived.
The stark rage on his face sent a shiver down Ashley’s spine, the last thing she saw before one of the EMTs shut the door of the ambulance.
* * *
“Stay back,” Jack warned his captain. “Everybody stay back.” He held on to the edge of the precipice as he looked at the sputtering mess before him.
Good. The bastard hadn’t drowned. Jack coughed up some water himself. He wanted to be looking into those soulless eyes when he pulled the trigger. He wanted the bastard to see death coming and know that it was coming from Jack Sullivan. He had his gun in his hand.
One bullet between the eyes.
He wanted it. He wanted his vengeance. He wanted blood on the ice. He wanted justice.
But would it be?
Or would it just be murder?
If he went over to the other side, could he come back again?
Ashley and Maddie were in the back of the ambulance. They would hear the shot. They would know.
He held his gun, swore at the half-conscious man, and punched the ice next to his head so hard with his free hand he cracked it. He was just pulling back his bloodied fist when Bing reached him.
“Jack, dammit. Step back. That’s an order.”
But he gripped the gun. He couldn’t release it.
* * *
Ashley sat in the back of the ambulance with Maddie, so cold that her teeth were chattering. She didn’t think she’d ever feel warm again. They huddled in their blankets, Maddie holding her hand while the EMT took her vitals. They’d given Maddie a very mild sedative to calm her, to head off her going into shock from the stress and the cold.
“Is Jack okay?” she asked as she leaned against Ashley sleepily.
“Yes, sweety.”
“Is the bad man going to hurt him?”
“No.” Things would happen the other way around, she figured, and wondered if she would ever see Jack again.
If he put a bullet through Graham’s brain, he’d be going off to jail. If he didn’t, the FBI would carry off Graham, and Jack would probably leave too. He would have no more reason to stay in Broslin.
The pain that accompanied that thought was worse than almost drowning again. She didn’t realize how much she’d come to care for him until she’d seen him disappear in that dark water.
Maddie fell asleep, her little body going limp.
The back door of the ambulance opened, but even that didn’t wake her. Jack climbed in, got wrapped up, then put his arms around them without saying a word.
The ambulance was moving, going down the road by the time he asked, “Are you okay? Maddie?”
She blinked back her tears as she nodded.
He took her hand, held it between his.
She let him. “What happened?”
“I t
hought Blackwell was important.” He drew a long breath, held her tighter. “Then I saw you go under with him as I was tearing down the road. It put things into perspective.”
“You let Bing take him?”
“The FBI is here. They’ll do what has to be done.” He reached up and brushed the wet hair out of her face.
“Probably look like a drowned rat,” she said, suddenly flustered.
“You look alive.” He gave a lopsided smile. “I like that look on you. It’s pretty damn fantastic.”
They sat in silence. He held her gaze as Maddie slept on her lap.
“I’m a no-good, messed-up, obsessed cop,” he said after a while. “You deserve better.”
“Says who? I’m a freaked-out, loopy artist.”
He gave a bark of a laugh and took her lips in a soft kiss.
~~~***~~~
Chapter Fifteen
He went with them to the hospital. They were all checked over for cuts and bruises as well as hypothermia. The doctor kept Maddie overnight for observation. Even though she hadn’t been in the water, she was a slight little thing and chilled through pretty fast. Since she was sleeping peacefully, the nurse sent Ashley home for a hot shower and rest. Jack got them a cab and went with her.
And stayed with her.
“Why don’t you grab a couple of hours of sleep?” he asked once she came out of the bathroom, wearing her thickest sweater and pants.
She wrapped her arms around herself. She didn’t think she would ever get warm again. “I should go in and wait for Maddie.”
“The nurse said she won’t be released until after the doctors make their rounds at eight in the morning.” He’d been up in the loft, looking out into the night.
She looked past him, out through the windows. The emergency vehicles had left, darkness blanketing the reservoir again. He didn’t ask if he could stay, but she would have said yes if he did. She didn’t want to be alone tonight.
“Go to sleep,” he said. “I’ll wake you up at seven and take you in.”
“You don’t have to.”
“She matters to me too.”
She felt a smile tug at her lips. “She was pretty impressed with the rescue.”